Stunned to see my team was ranked #1.... it's probably the kiss of death (kind of like being on the cover of Sports Illustrated pre-season). I have a great front line and SF, but average to weak at guards --- which is probably most important. I'll stick with my usual goal of a sweet 16. Longwood is rebuilding so the CVAC will be wide open this year. I haven't looked at teams closely so not sure who to rank high at this point.

Over at the Great Lakes Valley, we have 4 new coaches, bringing our human total to 11. The new teams are rebuilding but should be strong in a couple of seasons.
As usual, the pre-season voters don't like my Bellarmine Knights. We return 10 players from a 26-6, Elite Eight squad. And we received no top 25 votes.
Wiscosin-Parkside also made the Elite Eight last season, lost 5 players, and is #24.
Indianapolis lost in the 2nd round, graduated 4 players, and is #12

For being #3 northeastern St. is definitely over rated. Not sure what to expect with this team. I do return a good post and guard so there is a start. But with a couple juco's we might be all right. Just need IQ's to get better.

Incarnate Word received our annual Belarmine Beatdown (tm) last night. This wasn't notable, as this happens every year. What was notable were victories by the other 11 Heartland teams. Heartland occupies the top 2 rankings, 3 of the top 6, and moves to 28-8 in non conference play. Is this the year they knock the mighty CVAC off the top spot?

Posted by davefilby on 3/3/2013 10:30:00 AM (view original):Incarnate Word received our annual Belarmine Beatdown (tm) last night. This wasn't notable, as this happens very year. What was notable were victories by the other 11 Heartland teams. Heartland occupies the top 2 rankings, 3 of the top 6, and moves to 28-8 in non conference play. Is this the year they knock the mighty CVAC off the top spot?

While Longwood is down, Limestone, Pfieffer, and Queens could be very strong this season. The Heartland has a shot as Longwood and Bel Abbey both could have down seasons. (with Longwood, it's more of a guarantee that we are down this season) - so we will see.

This will definitely be an interesting CVAC-Heartland Challenge. The Heartland is stronger than ever, and the CVAC looks very strong too, but with some of the usual CVAC powers down a bit there could be an opening for the Heartland.

St. Mary's TX missed out on a guy in recruiting that could end up being as good or better than our current stud, Terry Coombs, but I like what we have on the roster for this season (despite having had to take a walkon for the first time in my tenure here). We have a very good group of guards and SFs this season, but we don't have a stud post scorer, and my best teams usually have better balance. I do think this current #2 ranking is a bit high, but with the Yarnell about to start and a road trip to 3-0 Minnesota, Duluth coming up we will find out very quickly how good (or not good) we are.